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Geordi La Forge falls in love with a woman accused of murder in an isolated communication relay station. The Enterprise crew investigates the crime, the only other suspect is a Klingon officer who frequently visited the station.

The blood traces match those of Uhnari, so Crusher assumes the cellular residue is Uhnari's also, but must study it further in her lab to make certain. Geordi La Forge explains to Riker that encrypted subspace messages are all sent through a particular channel, and that someone has tried to bypass the access protocols, perhaps taking or rewriting some of the messages. La Forge accesses the station's logs from the nearby quarters, but at first can see only a handful of official and personal entries by Uhnari. He peruses the logs accompanied by the dog, whom he discovers was Uhnari's pet. Uhnari seems to be an upbeat person, though appeared to have some problems with Rocha. The computer cuts out.

Meanwhile in sickbay, Dr. Crusher tries to get a clear DNA sample from the metallic plate, she guesses to Picard and Riker that a high-level phaser blast caused the death. It also could have been a Klingon disruptor, but Picard needs evidence since Klingon attacks have not occurred for seven years.

La Forge orders a diagnostic while he gets a coffee. Soon, he gets a visual of Uhnari.

Uhnari's personal letters continue to reveal her to be a spirited, romantic Haliian woman who was abused by her father, is intensely homesick for the rest of her family and traditions, and has difficulty getting along with "egomaniac" Rocha. At one point she confesses countermanding his orders. Uhnari also mentions in her log that CommanderMorag, an aggressive Klingon, has been harassing and threatening the station. La Forge reports this to CaptainJean-Luc Picard, and he then asks the Klingon governorTorak to investigate. At first, the governor is hesitant to help but Picard uses his influence as Gowron's Arbiter of Succession to convince him to help.

La Forge watches more of Lieutenant Uhnari's personal logs in his quarters. In the log, she states that she misses her mother's own muskan seed punch and how the replicators on the station cannot quite make it the same when a loud bang is heard. Uhnari asks if its Rocha. The log suddenly goes to static.

Back on the station, Worf, Riker and La Forge continue the investigation. Worf finds Klingon DNA traces. La Forge has most of Uhnari's logs, but cannot find Rocha's, telling Riker that whatever happened to the station's encrypted messages had a cascade effect on the communications storage system.

Eventually, the governor arrives at the Enterprise's position on the IKS Qu'Vat. Worf escorts Torak to the observation lounge and the governor has Uhnari brought in, very much alive.

Uhnari claims that Rocha suddenly and irrationally attacked her; she first tried to access the weapons locker, but next remembers escaping in the shuttle; she was picked up by the Klingons. Possibly owing to a head injury, Uhnari's memory for exactly what happened is spotty, but she doesn't remember Morag on the station when she left. Torak is faced with the evidence of Klingon DNA on the station, and continues to be angered by the accusation of any Klingon involvement. He permits them to talk to Morag. Dr. Crusher now assumes that the cellular residue on the station's deck plate is Rocha, but continues to analyze it.

While they wait for Commander Morag to arrive, La Forge escorts Uhnari out of the lounge, telling her he has a friend of hers that is probably eager to see her. La Forge brings Uhnari to his quarters, where he reunites her with her dog whose name is revealed to be Maura, named after a character in Cold Moon Over Blackwater, a gothic novel. He tells her she probably wants to be alone in assigned quarters after her recent ordeal. However, she tells him that she would like to go to a place that has a lot of activity since she has spent nine months on the station with only Rocha to talk to. They go to Ten Forward, where La Forge seems to know quite a bit about Uhnari, such as getting her muskan seed punch to drink and that she lived on a house on a hill growing up, which surprises the lieutenant. La Forge then confesses that he has reviewed her logs, as well as her personal correspondence. He explains that they thought she had been murdered and needed to investigate. She eventually understands. La Forge brings up her contemptuous relationship with her superior officer, Keith Rocha. She considered him hostile and obnoxious and felt she had to battle him to hold her own. But, she insists, she did not want to see him dead. La Forge asks why Rocha attacked her but Uhnari does not know. While taking Uhnari to her quarters, she asks La Forge, since he knows her the best from anyone on the Enterprise, if she seems like a person who would murder someone. La Forge admits she doesn't. She wishes him a good night in Haliian.

Riker has Rocha's Starfleet ID file brought up to Picard on his desktop monitor, showing that he was not as nasty as Uhnari's experience of him; in fact, he seems to have been a bright and promising officer. Uhnari's duty records, on the other hand, show her to be difficult and argumentative from her previous posting on Deriben V. Picard orders Riker to examine the shuttle to shed more light on her story, since there's still no hard evidence. There, Worf finds a missing phaser from the station in the shuttlecraft: it is set to kill.

"Captain's log, supplemental. The Qu'Vat has arrived with Commander Morag. We are preparing to question him regarding his involvement in the murder of Lieutenant Rocha."

Circumstantial evidence now points to her as possibly having killed Rocha, but she hotly denies this to Riker and Worf. Riker informs her that the phaser was found on level ten and all phasers in weapons lockers are set on level one. Uhnari still cannot recall what happened after her struggle with Rocha but admits she may have used the phaser in self-defense. Riker tells her that to inflict the cellular damage found in Rocha's remains, it would take a sustained phaser blast on level ten of thirty to forty seconds. At this point, La Forge defends her, saying that the phaser found hasn't even been established to be the murder weapon. La Forge tells Riker he is heading back to the station to try to retrieve Rocha's logs. Riker stops him and asks that he not get involved more with Uhnari, so his relationship doesn't cloud his judgment. La Forge responds back that he's "not the one making judgments."

Commander Morag arrives shortly thereafter. He describes how he investigated the station when they did not answer his hails. He confesses that he was the one who tried to bypass the access protocols and filched a number of priority Starfleet messages, but that while he saw blood and signs of a struggle, he did not kill anyone. Torak has Morag remain on the Enterprise under Starfleet custody at Picard's request, as he does not want to cause a diplomatic incident with the Federation.

On the station, La Forge discovers that Uhnari had established a subspace link with a console on the relay station and deleted a number of Rocha's personal logs, including a letter he was planning to send to Starfleet. Citing her as "belligerent and insubordinate", Rocha had planned to ask for a formal hearing. She explains that she did so because she was afraid that if Starfleet found the letter, they would blame her for the murder. Knowing her pattern of running away in panic when she is afraid, La Forge advises her to stay and face what has happened, and she agrees. They kiss passionately.

On the Enterprise, Dr. Crusher continues to examine the cellular residue in sickbay, which suddenly, upon contact with her skin, takes the form of her hand.

On the station, Uhnari and La Forge are quite close, and she introduces him to a Haliian custom in which their minds can telepathically connect, amplified by a large crystal ornament called a Canar.

Meanwhile, Crusher explains to Picard that these are not Rocha's remains, but a coalescent organism that feeds off other lifeforms, then assumes their shape. Rocha never worked at the station; it was the shapeshifter who killed him at his last post of duty in the remote Triona system and took his place. Crusher warns that what appears to be Uhnari may actually be the creature, the same applies for Morag. Worf and Riker leave to find them.

While Uhnari and Morag are examined, La Forge returns to his quarters, where he's been keeping Maura. The dog attacks him; which he mistakes as her wanting to play. Suddenly, Maura begins to morph into the coalescent organism they are searching for, and attacks La Forge. With the organism blocking his escape route, he reaches for his phaser in his drawer and fires but it does no damage to the organism. La Forge adjusts the setting of his phaser to maximum and fires again, vaporizing the organism completely. Catching his breath, La Forge sits on the floor relieved and thankful to be alive.

In Ten Forward, La Forge tells his theory, that Uhnari's memory loss after the Rocha-like creature attacked her was caused by the beginning coalescing process; which explains her feeling of having her memory drained out. Uhnari realizes she may indeed have taken the phaser and shot. She is grateful to La Forge for his advice and friendship but refuses his offer to recommend her for a post in communications on board. She knows she is not an ideal Starfleet officer, but tells him she is considering staying in Starfleet and perhaps one day serving aboard the Enterprise.

"We found traces of Klingon DNA on the station."
"You still try to blame us!"
"Have the courage to admit your mistakes. Or are you a lo'Be Vos?"
"At least I do not wear the uniform of the petaQ!"

- Worf and Governor Torak butting heads

"The Klingon Empire will not stand for these kinds of lies!"
"Governor Torak... I apologize. I can see that you honestly didn't know what happened aboard the station. I will just have to take this matter up with Gowron. I'm really sorry that we bothered you."

- Torak speaking with Picard, after Aquiel Uhnari stated in a log she was harassed by Morag, a Klingon

"Lieutenant Uhnari's logs reported that Commander Morag had been harassing the station."
"He was doing his job."

- Captain Picard and Governor Torak

"You know me better than anyone here. Do I seem like the kind of person who would murder someone?"
"No, you don't."

This story began as another attempt at providing La Forge with a recurring romance. At Michael Piller's suggestion, this was tied into a mystery in the manner of the 1944 film Laura, starring Gene Tierney, in which a detective investigating the murder of a woman named Laura falls in love with her, only to discover that she is alive and may herself be a killer. (Star Trek: The Next Generation Companion)

At first, Aquiel was to have been the killer, but it was felt that this was too similar to the film Basic Instinct. Keith Rocha and Morag were next considered, but dismissed as too obvious. According to Ronald D. Moore, "At one point, we finally said 'Why not the dog?'" Moore joked that he and Braga had considered calling the episode "Murder, My Pet!" (Star Trek: The Next Generation Companion)

It is noted that at this point there has been no Klingon raid on the Federation in "seven years". Moore added this to show that the situation can still be uneasy in the Federation-Klingon alliance. (Star Trek: The Next Generation Companion)

When asked what he would have done differently in his time on Star Trek, Moore stated that he would not have written "Aquiel". (AOL chat,1997)

The look of the coalescent organism also disappointed the staff. The designer said in an interview that many names were given to the creature, and that "[...] Mr. Peanut was probably the kindest that I had." FX supervisor Ronald B. Moore stated that the effect was subcontracted out and was delivered without enough time for the touch-ups to add texture and motion that he felt were needed. (Star Trek: The Next Generation Companion)